


When He Can Fight (and When He Cannot)

by rosewiththorns



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Competition, Detroit Red Wings, Discipline, Fighting, Gen, Kneeling, Kneeling Universe, M/M, Non-Sexual Submission, Push-Ups, Retailiation, Revenge, Temper, bad day, mentoring
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-20
Updated: 2015-11-20
Packaged: 2018-05-02 12:00:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,690
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5247491
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosewiththorns/pseuds/rosewiththorns
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Pavel teaches Teemu when it is acceptable to fight and when it isn't. Written per reader request.</p>
            </blockquote>





	When He Can Fight (and When He Cannot)

**Author's Note:**

> This story is based on the account of Teemu trying to start a fight with Brendan Smith at practice that needed to be separated by their teammates. It is set after that practice.

“He who knows when he can fight and when he cannot will be victorious.”—Sun Tzu

When He Can Fight (and When He Cannot) 

The entire day so far had been one fight after another, as far as Teemu Pulkkinen was concerned. It began with the war to climb out of bed when the alarm clock blared at him that it was time to abandon dreamland, continued with the internal conflict at Starbucks about which seasonal special to order—because the chestnut praline latte, the creme brûlée latte, and peppermint mocha all promised to taste delicious and decadent even through the laminated menu—and ultimately culminated at practice with a battle drill with Brendan Smith that had gotten too physical. Now his hackles were once again raised because Pavel Datsyuk had steered him into a meeting room after practice, and he hadn’t showered the twenty layers of sweat off him yet, which would have made someone who was having a far happier day than Teemu was irascible. 

“Why are we here?” demanded Teemu in a snappish voice that he hoped made it plain not only to Pavel but to any resident flies on the wall that in addition to wanting to get out of this conference room as quickly as possible, he hadn’t wished to enter it in the first place. 

“You need kneel.” Pavel gave one of his trademark grins: the one that declared whoever he was conversing with was welcome to underestimate his cunning and determination at their own peril. “Can do here in private, or somewhere else in public. Puck in your zone.” 

“I don’t want to kneel anywhere, Pav.” Scowling, Teemu folded his arms across his chest, because the last thing he desired to do after a frustrating practice was kneel. His pride was too bruised to not shatter into a million shards if he were humbled further, and kneeling was the ultimate gesture of vulnerability and submission, which didn’t come naturally to Teemu even when he wasn’t feeling prickly as a rosebush. 

“Come on, Teemu.” Pavel clapped him on the shoulder and then tossed a pillow from one of the chairs around the circle table on the floor. “Kneeling not that bad. I not bite your head off. I not cannibal.” 

“Why do I have to kneel?” Teemu’s chin lifted in revolt. “Smitty started it.” 

That was true, Teemu thought, as blood pounded like a war drum in his ears, and his cheeks flushed as if sunburned. Smitty had chopped at his hands and nailed him into the boards like Jesus getting hammered onto the cross by the Romans. It was as if Smitty—whose brain was prone to deleting important files on a daily basis—had not only forgotten that they were teammates but also had invented a fantasy world in which they were rivals who should be throwing cheap-shots at one another. 

When Pavel emitted a noncommittal grunt, Teemu went on, hot as a chili pepper, “He fucking slashed and boarded me in one play. If that’s not spoiling for a fight, neither is dropping a bomb on a city.” 

“I not talking to Smitty.” Pavel’s arched eyebrow announced more clearly than words that he was not impressed by Teemu’s excuse, and Teemu flinched. Pavel never said much, even in the one-on-one settings where he was at his most loquacious, but Teemu would be damned if Pavel didn’t have a knack for cutting to the heart of every matter like a surgeon’s knife, which maybe was a result of having surgeon’s hands. “I talking to you about what you did, not what Smitty did.” 

“You can talk all you like, Pav.” Teemu’s jaw clenched. “I’m not listening.” 

“Then I wait until you ready to listen, Teemu.” Undeterred, Pavel stared into Teemu’s icy blue eyes. “You do push-ups until you ready to listen and kneel.” 

Push-ups were Teemu’s least favorite exercise—he would rather be bag skated for an hour than have to complete fifteen push-ups—so, desperate to avoid doing that without losing any of his dignity by kneeling, he snorted, “Make me.” 

Almost immediately, Teemu regretted issuing this challenge when he felt Pavel’s palm slap his butt firmly: not hard enough to hurt but with the requisite force to emphasize that Pavel was serious and wouldn’t be defied. Gasping, Teemu jerked in shock, since, although he had received more painful love taps during goal celebrations, he had never been spanked—if that single smack could even be termed a spanking, which Teemu wasn’t positive that it could be—by Pavel, who was almost always gentle and patient with him rather than strict, when he knelt even though he had heard that rookies could be. 

Tears welling in his eyes not so much from the sting of the slap but from the shame of being so awful as to deserve it, Teemu collapsed to the floor and performed his first shaky push-up, which apparently didn’t meet Pavel the Fitness Fanatic’s exacting standards. 

“Elbows at ninety-degrees.” Pavel nudged his ankle with a foot. “Then hold position for at least a second.” 

Nodding in acknowledgement of the correction of his lackadaisical push-up technique, Teemu made the required modifications as he continued his push-ups. His legs, already aching from practice, swelled, his arms burned with pent-up lactic acid, and his hands, unaccustomed to bearing so much weight, screamed a silent protest. Eyes locked on the floor, he imagined Smitty’s smirking but vacuous expression etched into the tiles and cursed at Smitty for putting him in this miserable position. 

As each push-up became more difficult—eventually feeling as if he were struggling to perform the exercise while wrapped in concrete—his curses turned into sniffles, then dry sobs, and finally wet weeping that shook his body to the core, rendering him unable to do anything but crumble onto the floor in a ball of woe. Dimly, he remembered that Pavel had commanded him to do push-ups until he was ready to kneel and to listen to whatever lecture Pavel had planned about not fighting with teammates, yet he couldn’t bring himself to think about kneeling, not because he was too proud (he had no vestige of that now) and not even because his knees were throbbing. No, he just felt as if he were too disgusting, too self-pitying a creature to even be worthy of kneeling at Pavel’s feet. 

“Come here, Teemu.” As if he could read the guilty, borderline self-loathing thoughts whirling through Teemu’s brain, Pavel, who had seated himself in the chair in front of the pillow he had thrown on the floor while Teemu was doing push-ups, patted his knee. 

“You”—A breath rattled like a tin can out of Teemu’s heaving lungs—“want me to come to you?” 

“Always,” Pavel murmured, and Teemu, too weary to bother standing up when he would be getting back down on his knees in a few seconds anyway, crawled over to the pillow and knelt before Pavel, who cupped his chin between tender palms and asked, “You know why I make you do push-ups?” 

“Because I was being rude and rebellious.” Teemu bit his lip and tasted the iron of blood on his tongue. 

“You get such silly ideas.” Chuckling, Pavel lifted a hand to ruffle the wisps of Teemu’s wintry sunlight hair. “Kneeling not for me. It for you.” 

“What do you mean, Pav?” Teemu’s forehead crinkled in bemusement. 

“Exactly what I say.” His eyes gleaming, Pavel slid the fingers that had been rustling Teemu’s hair down to massage the nape of his neck, untying the tense knots coiled in the muscles there. “You need to calm down after you get riled in practice, and based on how you act, just kneeling not enough to do that, so I make you do push-ups. Push-ups get rid of your anger, not my anger.” 

“Oh.” Teemu cocked his head as he considered this explanation. “I thought discipline was good for me.” 

“It is.” Managing to be both stern and affectionate, Pavel squeezed Teemu’s shoulder. “You need be more disciplined in practice and not fight your teammates. Tussling okay, but not fighting that forces your teammates to pull you apart.” 

His lips quirking into a slight snicker, Teemu recalled how Pavel had wasted no time after his return to full-contact practice from his off-season ankle surgery (which had sounded painful as hell to Teemu) in wrestling like a puppy along the boards with Hank, because age and injuries couldn’t steal Pavel’s laughter and playful spirit. 

“I serious.” Apparently convinced Teemu wasn’t treating this discussion with the appropriate amount of gravity, Pavel shook Teemu’s shoulders lightly in reproof. “No fighting teammates.” 

“Smitty slashed and boarded me.” Teemu couldn’t stifle a petulant pout. “Anyone would’ve tried to punch his nose off, Pav. I mean, what the fuck was I supposed to do? Just take the abuse like some damn pansy?” 

“Don’t retaliate or begin fight, but just because you not start something doesn’t mean you not finish it,” replied Pavel with the sly undertone that usually meant he wanted Teemu to mine some hidden gem from his words. 

His forehead frowning in a mimicry of the twist to his mouth, Teemu contemplated Pavel’s advice but could not sift out anything that showed the potential of being a shining jewel once the grime was removed. “Is what you’re saying actually intended to make sense, Pav?” he muttered finally, lifting his palms in defeat. 

“Get revenge and hit the person who is rough with you, but be clean and wait for your opening.” Pavel clapped Teemu on the back. Assuming angelic facade that might have concealed a devilish sense of humor, he added, “Then if anyone try to accuse you of anything, put on innocent face. Look like flower, but be serpent underneath.”

“You have the worst not-guilty face in the whole league.” Laughing, Teemu rolled his eyes. “For Christ’s sake, you look like a kitten caught peeing on the carpet.” 

“Not me. Must be confusing me with someone else, Teemu.” Pavel’s gaze widened earnestly as he pointed a finger at his guileless features. “This face win Lady Byng four times in row.”


End file.
